Mine probably isn’t that secret these days, but almost every sauce I add nutritional yeast to. Curry, chilli, bolognese, it just makes them all better.
Acid. Lemon juice, lime juice, vinegar, and/or wine. Salt and acid make the existing flavors fucking pop.
For anything cheesy, add a touch of nutmeg. Not enough to identify it, but enough to know that something changed.
Taste as you go.
Couldn’t tell you. Every time I make something really good that’s worth repeating, the recipe is immediately wiped from my mind forever. It’s like some monkey’s paw curse that I can only make the thing the most delicious way once.
Also, butter.
I have the same issue with seasonings. I can never remember how much of what i used to make a perfect dish. With all the smart things being made, what we need are smart seasoning containers, just think after a long cooking you sit down to eat and can pull up an app to see you used 2 grams of this 5 grams of that. You mark the dish then next time you’re cooking you pull up the app and it reminds you on how much to use.
You could weigh the containers before and after
Im to dumb and lazy too do that. Hence why smart containers would be nice.
Never measure. Just throw. You know you’ve seasoned it enough when the spirits of your ancestors step in.
I still pine for that ham bone soup I drunk-made after Christmas that one times.
I get the same. I make something that everyone says is delicious and I genuinely have no idea how much of what went in. I guess it just comes with knowing the basics well enough.
the recipe is immediately wiped from my mind forever
You guys are getting recipes? Jk.
Smell, taste, and timing are the keys to great food. Take a whiff and add what’s missing.
Methodical testing is for sharing results after you have a solid grasp of what tastes good.
either that, or it only tastes so good the first time, even if your recreate it exactly.
That’s why I’m designing a recipe app where I can keep notes etc for everything I make.
MSG
King of Flavour
Generally, salt or MSG. I find people tend to under-season their dishes, and not layer flavors as they cook.
MSG comes in many forms: cheese, tomato, mushroom, fish sauce, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce… MSG powder.
I’m not taling Uncle Roger portions here. Just a teaspoon of the naturally occurring stuff, a couple splashes of the sauces, or just or a pinch of straight MSG is all it takes to add a bit of savory depth to a dish. I get good feedback about my cooking. Occasionally I overdo the salt, but no so much as to render it inedible. It helps to move the table wine along.
Back incollege, I was a waitress at an Italian restaurant. A lady came in ordered a dish with lots of tomato in it, then demanded I tell the chef she was allergic to MSG, in an accusatory way. What she didn’t know is that I was going to school for a medical based degree, and recently had a professor go off about how MSG is in tons of foods naturally and not to believe the craze about it being bad for you.
“Oh my gosh! You’re allergic to MSG!?! I’m sorry, but all tomatoes contain MSG. Please choose another dish” … “I’m sorry, ma’am but mushrooms have MSG in them too. I’ll talk to my chef and see what suggestions he might have.”
She changed her tone “I’m not allergic, I just don’t want it added… it’s bad for you… blah blah”
I didn’t get tipped, but it was hella satisfying to passive- aggressively educate her.
Yeah, I’ve a customer like that, absolutely convinced he’s allergic to MSG. Pours ketchup all over everything.
Dry yellow mustard powder in mac and cheese. Not the fiery English or Chinese stuff, just boring American yellow mustard.
Nah man, Coleman’s is the one and only.
Well as a Hispanic, I’m obligated to say adobo, sazon and or sofrito…
But cumin is fire in a lot of things too… Like wanna add flavor but no salt? Sprinkle in a lil cumin. Mac n cheese with cumin is a vibe.
MSG in everything except eggs. Doesn’t go well with eggs for some reason.
Bahaha someone else on here recommended MSG and I was like, “Oh yeah, I should go make some eggs and sprinkle some MSG on there.”
Last mile seasoning! Shortly before your dish is ready to serve check for salt acid and heat, and adjust accordingly. This is critical!!!
This thread is fucking awesome and I’m gonna try lots of these.
My Ukranian mate showed me the ways of vegeta. No, not the anime character, the seasoning. Put that shit on fried eggs and never look back.
Actually you can add it to lots of stuff. But eggs were the first thing I experienced it with.
I had no idea that was a real thing! I saw Vegeta mentioned in another comment and thought it was a typo lol
Not an ingredient necessarily, but I toast rice with spices before cooking it. I throw some oil and garlic in the pot I’m going to cook the rice in, then put in the rice and (for mexican-like dishes) garlic powder, onion powder, chili powder, cumin, a little oregano, a little cayenne pepper, and salt. I mix that all up continuously over medium heat for a couple minutes, then I add the water and cook the rice. It makes an incredible difference in taste
Your “secret recipe” is risotto.
Salt :D
Lots of home cooks are shy with seasoning in general (but especially salt). While not impossible, it’s fairly hard to over season stuff.
That’s why if you ever look at “miracle season alls” the first ingredients are usually something like “Salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder”.
If you want to be amused, look at these ingredients lists. Often the only difference is what food coloring is used.
For example.
https://www.heb.com/product-detail/tony-chachere-s-original-creole-seasoning/172479
While not impossible, it’s fairly hard to over season stuff.
I disagree here. Unless you’re used to overseasoned food already, it’s pretty easy to be heavy handed on the salt.
Yes and no.
Some salts are easier to work with than others. Kosher salt, in particular, is fairly hard to over season with because you can visually see just how much you’ve thrown onto a steak or such. Fine salt, on the other hand, is a lot easier to over season with.
But then it also depends a lot on the dish. Sauces are really hard to over season. The sea of fluid can absorb a fair amount of salt before it’s noticeable. Meats are similar. A steak can have a snow covering of kosher salt and it won’t really taste super salty.
Bread, on the other hand, will be noticeably worse if you throw in a tbs of salt instead a tsp.
But salt wasn’t specifically what I was thinking when I wrote that. Herbal seasoning garlic, rosemary, thyme, sage, etc, generally won’t overpower a dish if you have too much of them. Especially if you aren’t working with the powdered form. (Definitely possible to over season something with garlic salt/powder).
Just like adding a pinch of salt can improve any dish, adding a dash of Worcestershire sauce can improve them for the same reasons but different taste group.
And more generally, if you taste something and feel like it’s missing something, go through each of the taste groups and consider if that is what it’s missing. Sweet, salty, acidic, umami are the main ones (I’ve never felt like a dish is missing bitterness, but maybe that’s a weakness in my cooking). Spicy isn’t a flavour group but can add to a dish and/or mask a lack of balance.
Also, do this balancing act after you’ve added all the ingredients because they can bring their own biases to the dish.
In my experience, when a dish tastes like it’s missing something, most of the time it’s acid. My go-to is a healthy squirt of yellow mustard.
Coffee: just put like a 16th or 32nd of a teaspoon of cayenne in the grounds, gives a depth of flavour people love. Just a miniscule amount, they should never spot it for what it is.
Specifically cayenne?
Yes, for a specific effect. It gives a smoky depth of flavour and much improves some shitty coffees. The dude here saying a pinch salt, that works too but a different effect.
I’ve used a dash of salt in french press when I have very few options over how its made, it takes off the bitterness and adds no saltiness.
Use a real fucking measurement Jesus christ
It is a “real fucking measurement,” just not one you use. 1 US teaspoon is approximately 5 ml.
I recognize that US measurements are stupid and don’t make any sense to those who don’t use them, i.e. the entire rest of the world, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t real measurements.
Don’t get me wrong, I totally wish I didn’t have to have a chart giving me conversions between teaspoons, tablespoons, and cups on my fridge, but recipes in the US are all in our dumb measurements so it’s what we’re used to. I also wish everything would be measured by weight instead of volume, but here we are.
expressing a 16th of a teaspoon in mL is just awkward. I’m Canadian, believe me, i understand both systems perfectly well and use what works best situationally.
Are fractions upsetting?
A “table spoon” is already not a proper unit, fractions of it are just abhorrent
Americans use sticks and tablespoons to measure butter and it does my fucking head in. A tablespoon of oil, however, is perfectly acceptable.
learn to cook
found the chemical technician
My ex used to go insane following her mother’s recipes for things, which she had to “feel”. Write an SOP or GTFO was usually her motto
Last year I picked a huge amount of mushrooms in the forest, dehydrated them (you can buy a dehydrator or use an oven) and ground them to a powder.
I put mushroom powder in damn near everything I cook, gives it a nice hit of umami.Dried shiitake mushroom powder slaps hard
Hell yeah. Unfortunately they don’t grow where I live, but we have plenty of Porcinis and Chanterelles which taste amazing
I never pick any mushrooms which could potentially be confused with anything toxic. Even if I’m 99% sure, that’s not enough.
I spread pesto inside my grilled cheese sandwiches
What cheese though?
